


Getting Warmer

by Steals_Thyme (Liodain)



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombies, Blow Job, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Smut, Temperature Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-09
Updated: 2009-09-10
Packaged: 2017-10-06 11:25:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/53173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liodain/pseuds/Steals_Thyme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A trio of ficlets set in Etherati's Zombieverse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Iron String

**Author's Note:**

  * For [etherati](https://archiveofourown.org/users/etherati/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Now, As Before](https://archiveofourown.org/works/57942) by [etherati](https://archiveofourown.org/users/etherati/pseuds/etherati). 



It's the early hours, determined by baseline static and an eerie stillness that renders any noise alien and disquieting. Dan wakes, drawn from sleep by the absence of a cool weight against his back.

Yellow light presses against the windows, etching a familiar silhouette. Rorschach is perched on the edge of the bed, muscles quivering in lines of tension as he holds himself still. Dan starts to ask the obvious question, but before he can form the first syllable there's a pale hand dancing into a square of moonlight, fingers rigid and ghostly. _Quiet_, it means, followed by a cant of his head that says, _I hear something._

There's a muffled clatter from downstairs.

Adrenaline flushes through him, and the world sharpens. Dan slides to the edge of the bed, friction of skin on cotton sheets far too loud. Rorschach turns his head, catching glimmers of diffuse light with eyes that opalesce like pearls. "Owl's Nest," he mouths silently.

Dan pulls on yesterday's jeans and follows Rorschach onto the landing, each foot placed with precision, circumventing every creaking floorboard. His partner prowls ahead of him, stalking, moon and shadow and sodium mottle him like a wildcat.

The kitchen is dark, the room strange with tall shadows that shift and pounce under passing car headlights. The basement door is open in a yawning black maw - the hasp undamaged. On the table sits the padlock, the key nestled inside. Rorschach glares at Dan in silent rebuke.

There's no time for apologies or excuses because a dark shape hurls itself out of the basement, bowling into Dan and there are flashes of pallid skin, rimmed eyes and a snarling bloodied mouth and in that instant he realizes what their intruder is, what they are dealing with here.

Rorschach is yelling and he's paralyzed, decades of experience jilting him as his bones rattle against the linoleum and his heart thuds in his throat and it must be able to taste his terror as teeth bear down and it's not Rorschach at his neck and all he can do is _scream_ because Hell is empty and all the devils are—

—head arced back, illuminated briefly, teeth slick and shining with saliva. An unnatural angle to its neck, yanked back by the hair and—

—a fist twists viciously and there's cracking bone and cold blood spatters his face and there's more teeth, buried in flesh and tearing, tearing and roaring—

—there's a dead weight on his chest and hands at his neck but it's not a hungry, wild-eyed revenant it's not it's not it's—

—and the lock is on the basement door and the table is pushed in front of that, and there's a chair propped under the bedroom doorhandle and he's shivering under sheets bunched tight around him.

Cool hands stroke back his hair, fingertips tracing over his face and lingering around his throat where tomorrow there will be ugly black bruises, and Dan can't even sob because he so desperately doesn't want this to mean—

He tilts his head back, clutches at Rorschach's shirt and presses shaking hands to his chest, and only when cool lips touch his neck and a soothing tongue laves across his Adam's apple does he let himself breathe again, in deep hitching gulps.

Under his palms, Rorschach's heart vibrates.


	2. Convection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rorschach cools Dan down (and heats him up).

It's late morning, and already hot enough to fry eggs on the sidewalk. The sun beats down implacably from the expansive sky, casting a thrall over the city and transfixing New York's denizens under its searing, Cyclopean gaze. Someone's cracked open a hydrant - probably kids playing - and walking through the spray is a temporary balm to Dan's overheated body as he makes his way home.

He ducks off the street into the welcome shade of the brownstone, and drops his bag of groceries on the kitchen table. He blinks as his vision adjusts to the comparative gloom, brilliant bleached-out afterimages dancing in front of his eyes. He's sweating just from the ten minute walk from the store, sunscreen is sitting greasily on his arms and face and it's already too hot in the house, too humid and close. He fidgets irritably and considers taking yet another shower.

For now he strips off his damp shorts and t-shirt. His usual wool and tweed ensemble would be unbearable, so he'd grudgingly donned thin cotton that did nothing to disguise his physique; the speculative gaze of the cashier at the store had made him more uncomfortable than he'd care to admit. He sits and then sprawls out on the linoleum, but it warms too quickly against his skin, makes it stick and perspire. He gets up again with a peeling noise and a disgruntled sigh, and shoves his head in the fridge under the pretense of putting away groceries.

His head rattles the top shelf when icy fingertips brush across his back and begin walking slowly up his spine.

"I didn't hear you come in," he says, feigning nonchalance although there's no way Rorschach missed his startled lurch.

"Realize that." The fingers reach the back of his neck, sweep away hair curled with sweat. "Checking expiration dates?"

"Clad in naught but my underwear," he replies, voice hollowed by the fridge interior. "Tis a bold endeavor."

A cool palm presses along the ridge of his spine, and Dan shivers at a stirred memory; of chill breath drifting over dampened skin, an open mouth pressed to that same spot. He leans into the touch with a slow exhale.

"You're too hot," Rorschach says, hands splaying out over Dan's shoulder blades, patterning him like frost. "Remember what that was like, sometimes." There's nothing wistful in his voice.

"Like I'm gonna combust," Dan closes the fridge door, braces against it. Rorschach's fingers are moving, sliding over the muscles in his back, etching bright, sharp lines that melt when the contact trails elsewhere. It ignites a lazy coil of desire in Dan's belly, and he snorts at the irony.

"Helping?" Fingertips smooth their way upwards and burrow into his hair, blissfully cool against his scalp.

"Mm. S'good."

Rorschach presses himself fully against Dan's back, arms snaking around his waist, and though he's not shockingly frigid, the sudden coolness still makes Dan hiss like a quenched blade. He guesses Rorschach has been basking in the sun, residual warmth still clings to his shirt buttons.

He lets his head roll back onto Rorschach's shoulder, and a bristled cheek rasps against his own. Those hands are working over his chest and abdomen in slow arcs, sloughing away feverish warmth from every contour and sinking numb sensation into the muscles, until Dan is sculpted in hard ice and burning with an entirely different heat.


	3. Breathless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rorschach can hold his breath for a very long time

His breath moves like a string of pearls, rippling up through the water and disturbing the surface tension with concentric circles. Each pocket of air is audible as it breaks, resonating in the deep silence he's splayed in; senses isolated. His hair billows and drifts around his face like seaweed, rich copper against porcelain and pale skin.

It's bright down here, clean light reflecting off pristine white surfaces, refracting brilliantly and marbling the walls with seams of quicksilver. Warm, too. An encompassing heat that eases into his bones, enveloping and soothing him, making him feel heavy enough to sink through the world.

He doesn't breathe for a very long time.

But he is alive, and living things like him need air. He breaches the surface, water cascading away from him and scattering droplets as his hands grip the sides of the tub, sending rivulets to pool on the bathroom floor. He heaves in a breath, relishing the burn in his lungs. Alive.

"That's impressive," Daniel says, leaning with the small of his back against the washbasin, towel tucked around his waist. "A little disturbing, but impressive."

Rorschach makes a small noise of amusement. Perhaps once it would have bothered him that he hadn't noticed Daniel come into the room (he hasn't felt the need to lock the door for weeks now), but for the moment he is entertaining himself with the idea that Daniel came to take a shower, and found a battered, pallid body floating in his bathtub.

And people say he doesn't have a sense of humor.

"Six minutes, at least," Daniel is saying, watching him as he pushes his hair out of his eyes, fingers tangling in the rough, darkened curls. Daniel's voice is light, but there's something beneath that levity, a dark undercurrent tugging at his words and saturating them in a swell of desire.

Rorschach steps out of the tub, unguarded, but aware of his nakedness. He's more comfortable in his own skin than he's ever been, but self-consciousness still prickles at him, bristles and itches like fresh sutures. More so when Daniel looks at him like this, all shining eyes and surging affection. It's difficult sometimes, almost too bright to look at, too hot to touch.

Almost.

"Can do better than that," he says, pressing close to rumble the words against Daniel's neck, moisture collecting where their chests meet. The towel is rough against his thighs, skin searing even against his water-warmed body.

Daniel's breath is coming shorter, heat of it evaporating droplets from his shoulder. "Oh?" he manages, all of his words caught up, apprehended by this sudden, unnamed anticipation.

Rorschach rakes his fingers down his sides, along hard muscle. Catches his hips, squeezes. "Hn."

The towel unfurls, peels away, drops to the floor.

Rorschach follows, palms smoothing over heavy, strong thighs. Daniel murmurs softly; a wordless incantation that banishes old demons, those inexorcisable voices that don't know they're dead, that always try to draw the festering poison of his old life back to the surface.

Daniel is a hot brand against his cheek, is gentle fingers stroking his hair. Is saying, "you don't have to," in a voice that's tender and breathless, that would never betray if he were disappointed.

It doesn't seem right to tell him to shut up, so Rorschach tries his teeth on the sensitive skin on the inside of his thigh, teasing the flesh until it reddens. Daniel tries to gasp, it catches in his throat and becomes a groan, low and drawn out, spiking higher again as Rorschach laves the spot with his tongue.

Daniel is looking down at him, lick of hair curling against his forehead and eyes shadowed under the bright fluorescents, soft mouth parted and moistened and on the brink of saying something. Rorschach doesn't want to hear it, though, doesn't need to apply meaning to this with inadequate words; they could never hope to describe something so complicated and important.

He slicks his tongue along Daniel's cock, and the syllables fall away.

Daniel jerks forward, his hand fists convulsively in Rorschach's hair and then releases with a silent apology, a whisper of air through his lips. Rorschach tightens his grip on Daniel's hips, holding him steady as he ducks his head again, tasting his heat, letting it roll across his tongue.

His saliva glistens there when he pulls back. Daniel is murmuring under his breath, indistinct, fingers stroking feather-light over Rorschach's brow and cheekbones, thumbing at his mouth.

He takes a breath, lets Daniel tilt his chin up, wonders if his face mirrors his partner's, if he holds that same expression of lust and wonder, of indescribable—

He knows he can do this, for him. Because sometimes taking and giving are the same thing.

He pulls Daniel into his mouth, slides him over his tongue and he knows how this is supposed to go; Daniel has shown him how, with shining lips and smiling eyes and soft, warm hands that calm and soothe and say: _it's okay. This is okay_.

A hitched breath from above him, and the tip of his nose is tickled by dark curls. He hums deep in his throat and that breath becomes a sigh, becomes a thin vocalization that sends a raw quiver of pleasure shuddering over him.

He doesn't breathe for a very long time.


End file.
